Keeping Children Safe and Healthy

Home Safety Checklist

Safety advice is free for all parents with children under 5 years. A Family Support Worker will come out to see you in your home to complete a Home Safety Checklist. The Checklist helps to identify what can be considered to help make your home safer for your child, for example safety gates on stairs and fire guards.

The Importance of Child Immunisations

As a parent, you may not like seeing your baby or child being given an injection. However, vaccination is an important step in protecting your child against a range of serious and potentially fatal diseases.

Vaccinations are quick, safe and extremely effective. Once your child has been vaccinated against a disease, their body can fight it more effectively. If a child isn’t vaccinated, they will have an increased risk of catching the illness. Routine childhood vaccinations start when a baby is two months old.

Vitamin D

Vitamin D has several important functions. For example, it helps regulate the amount of calcium and phosphate in the body. These nutrients are needed to keep bones and teeth healthy.

A lack of Vitamin D can lead to bone deformities such as rickets in children, and bone pain and tenderness as a result of a condition called osteomalacia in adults.

We get most of our Vitamin D from sunlight on our skin. The vitamin is made by our body under the skin in reaction to summer sunlight. However, if you are out in the sun, take care to cover up or protect your skin with Sunscreen before you turn red or get burnt.

Vitamin D is also found in a small number of foods, such as:

Oily fish, such as salmon, sardines and mackerel

Eggs

Fortified fat spreads

Fortified breakfast cereal

Powdered milk

Healthy Start – Free Milk, Fruit, Vegetables and Vitamins

With Healthy Start, you get free vouchers every week to spend on milk, plain fresh and frozen fruit and vegetables, and infant formula milk. You can also get free vitamins.

To qualify for Healthy Start vouchers you must be at least 10 weeks pregnant or have a child under the age of four and in receipt of one of the following benefits:

Income Support or Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance, or

Child Tax Credits but not working tax unless your family is receiving working tax run-on only and an annual family income of £16,190 or less.

To apply for Healthy Start please speak to your Health Visitor.

Road Safety

It is important to teach children road safety as everyone uses roads, and road danger impacts everyone. Simple steps such as teaching your child to hold hands, to Stop, Look and Listen and to use designated pedestrian crossings could save your child from danger.

Car Seats

It is vital that you obtain professional advice when purchasing a car seat. It is important to know what type of car seat your child needs based on their height and weight and the correct way to fit the seat into your car. It is also important to remember to fasten the seat belt before setting off